Chinese community group urges fire safety vigilance

11 Sep 2012, 8:54 am   -   Source: Rhiannon Elston, SBS
Share This
0 
+ Comment
0
Chinese student Yinuo Jiang remains in critical but stable condition in Liverpool Hospital after last week's apartment blaze in the Sydney suburb of Bankstown.

Chinese student Yinuo Jiang remains in critical but stable condition in Liverpool Hospital after last week's apartment blaze in the Sydney suburb of Bankstown.

A campaign group for Sydney’s Chinese-speaking community is urging students and new migrants to be vigilant about fire safety in the wake of a fatal unit block blaze in Bankstown last week.

RELATED

A campaign group for Sydney’s Chinese-speaking community is urging students and new migrants to be vigilant about fire safety in the wake of a fatal unit block blaze in Bankstown last week.

Lily Ho, spokesperson for New Voice, says many of the groups’ members are ex-students who have experienced first-hand unsafe living conditions in Sydney’s rental market.

A personal connection to last week’s tragedy prompted the group to speak out about fire safety and potential risks.

“One of our members, he actually had some friends who knows the victim. His friend tells him the parents [are] very sad,” explains Ms Ho. “When we rented apartments, we know that some of the apartments are in really poor condition.” 

The group is calling on Chinese students and new migrants living in NSW to “be concerned [about] where they rent,” particularly when it comes to potentially hazardous behaviour such as overcrowding.

“Some landlords, they actually divide apartments into small segments that can hold more people in one apartment. That’s actually illegal,” says Ms Ho.

She recalls visiting a friend living in a three-bedroom apartment in Sydney’s central business district. “The living room had been [filled] with twin beds, there are three people living in one bedroom. This three-bedroom place had nearly ten people living there.”

This kind of scenario is typical of young Chinese students living in Sydney, she adds. “I would say in the city that’s probably quite a big percentage… [perhaps] more than 60 per cent.”

Those affected need to take action to ensure their safety, says Ms Ho.

“We urge students to check out evacuation paths, and to see if the apartment is illegally divided by landlords.”

Smoke alarm concerns

A 1997 survey by NSW Health found while 58 per cent of households surveyed in the state had a smoke alarm, only 30 per cent of homes in Chinese-speaking communities had one.

Having a landlord “thought to be unsympathetic to the need for alarms” was highlighted as a major reason more families didn’t have access to a smoke alarm within the NSW Chinese-speaking community.

The report also noted a “lack of awareness over the need for smoke alarms.”

A spokesperson for Fire and Rescue NSW says it’s not the absence of smoke alarms but a lack of understanding of their purpose that is the main area of concern.

“Firefighters also have concerns about international students living in overcrowded conditions, and that many are unaware of the emergency Triple-Zero (000) telephone number.”

Unsafe cooking practices

The Fire and Rescue NSW spokesperson says unsafe cooking practices can also contribute to fire risks in some Asian communities.

“Firefighters have found there is a tendency among some people from Asian backgrounds who use unsafe cooking practices, such as portable LPG burners inside the home, to cover up smoke alarms, which impairs normal operation.”

Ms Ho says this problem is persistent throughout the community. “A lot of Chinese, when we cook with stir fry, we have lots of smoke. [But] in the apartment if you trigger the smoke alarm, you get a fine.” 

“What people do is they pull out the battery, or they put out sticky tape over the smoke alarm.” 

Firefighters have ruled out suspicious circumstances in last week’s fire, but have said the building would not pass safety standards in 2012. 

Fire Safety , Rhiannon Elston SBS

  • Follow us: 
  • Follow us on Facebook
  • Follow us on Twitter
  • Follow us on Youtube

Join the Discussion

Name
City / Suburb E.g. Artarmon, Sydney
Title
Comment
You have characters remaining.
Validation
What's this?
This is a captcha-picture. It is used to prevent mass-access by robots.
All submitted comments become the property of SBS. They are moderated, so we reserve the right to edit comments and remove HTML tags. Not all submitted comments will be published. Publication does not mean we endorse the opinions expressed. Please read our terms and conditions for more information.